By Tobijulo Onifade

According to the Apple dictionary, a banknote is a piece of paper money, constituting a central bank’s promissory note to pay a stated sum to the bearer on demand. I am a bit fascinated by banknotes; I see them as an illustrated I.D of a country. There are many beautifully decorated banknotes but the Central African CFA Franc is one of my favourites.

According to the African Business Magazine website, CFA stands for Communauté Financière Africaine (African Financial Community). This is the currency of six independent African countries in Central Africa. The countries include Cameroon, Republic of Congo, Chad, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea and the Central African Republic. There is a western African equivalent of this currency as there are quite a number of countries in West African that use the CFA (West African CFA franc). This currency was introduced to these countries by their former French colonies. There is an ongoing argument on whether these countries are truly independent as the franc is seeing as a symbol of their former colonies power, but that’s not for today.

I came across the banknotes sometime in 2012/2013 and I was awed by the design of the notes. The notes are really colourful and the illustrations are delightful. You can easily get a sense of the culture and identity of the people by the design of the currency.

Below are some pictures of the Central African Republic Banknotes one of the six independent states that use the CFA.

500 Francs:

1974: (F) Bokassa (B) Students

1991: (F) Woman (B) Chemistry students

1000 Francs:

1974: (F) Bokassa (B) Rhino carvings

1980-1991 Butterfly and Waterfalls

10,000 Francs:

This is my personal favourite, the colours, Patterns, and Illustrations form a beautiful narrative.

(F) Woman and Antelope (B) Transport and Communication

For more information and pictures of the Central African Republic and the rest of the CFA countries banknotes, you can check http://banknoteindex.com and https://www.banknotes.com/cf.htm.

Information from:

http://africanbusinessmagazine.com/uncategorised/a-brief-history-of-the-cfa-franc/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_African_CFA_franc

http://banknoteindex.com/browse.mhtml?browseBy=Country&browse=Central%20African%20Republic&offset=0

http://banknoteindex.com/browse.mhtml?browseBy=Country&browse=Central%20African%20Republic&offset=10